WORLD> Newsmaker
|
WORLD> Newsmaker
|
|
Sen. Kennedy has malignant brain tumor: doctors
(Agencies)
Updated: 2008-05-21 10:15 Robert Byrd, 90, the West Virginia Democrat who is the longest-serving senator in history, wept on the Senate floor while discussing Kennedy's health. "I love you and I miss you," Byrd said. Kennedy, the longest serving current senator after Byrd, is the youngest brother of the late President John Kennedy, who was assassinated in 1963, and Sen. Robert Kennedy, who was shot dead in 1968. He was airlifted to Massachusetts General Hospital on Saturday morning after being taken by ambulance to a local hospital near his family's Cape Cod vacation compound. A malignant tumor is actively growing and will require treatment. Dr. Lynne Taylor, a neuro-oncologist at the University of Washington in Seattle, said the hospital statement suggested Kennedy had one of two very dangerous forms of brain tumor -- either an anaplastic astrocytoma or a glioblastoma multiforme. Both usually kill within three years, sometimes within months. "Because it is in the left parietal lobe, close to the parietal temporal lobe, that is where the speech center is and could render it unremovable," Taylor said in a telephone interview. She said it would be important to know how large the tumor is. After two or three days staff at the hospital will know more about what type of tumor Kennedy has, she added. The American Cancer Society estimates that around 8,400 people in the United States are diagnosed with a glioma every year. Such tumors arise from brain cells known as glial cells and can cause a range of symptoms, including the seizure Kennedy suffered. Certain types of chemotherapy can get into the brain to attack the tumor, but highly targeted radiation is also used to directly kill the tumor cells.
|
